World Football
In the last few decades, Australian football (soccer) gained more and more popularity. This is partly due to the good performances of the national team, but also to the fact that Australian people get the hand of this dynamic and technical team sport. A lot of Australian players were recruited abroad, playing for important European football teams, which contributed to a new attitude towards soccer in Australia.
Who is playing soccer in Australia?
Soccer is very popular at grassroots level in Australia, and everyone enjoys the game, young or old, boys or girls. Still, professional soccer doesn’t have the same attendance and national support as other team sports, like cricket – at least not now. This is why the games from the national soccer tournament are organized during summer, to avoid conflict with other team sports. However, prospects look great for Australian soccer, and the popularity of this sport increased a lot with the participation of the national team in two consecutive editions of the FIFA World Cup: 2006 and 2010. The national soccer team benefits a lot from the fact that more and more Australian players gained experience while playing in powerful, European club teams.
Australian soccer infrastructure
A lot of soccer fields are available throughout Australia. Also, the fact that almost any type of grass covered field (rugby fields, for example) can be adjusted for playing soccer with minimum efforts works in favor of soccer. Also, since soccer is not a contact sport, a lot of schools offer to their students the opportunity to play soccer. The game is equally popular among boys and girls (unlike Europe, where the game is played almost exclusively by boys and men). Since a lot of young people love playing the game and since Australia is a very sport-oriented country, it’s very likely that soccer popularity will continue to grow in the following years.
Australia national association football team – the Socceroos
When it comes to official international competitions, Australia is represented by the national team, also known as the Socceroos. The Football Federation Australia, currently a member of the Asian football confederation, manages the national team. The Socceroos have a lot of reasons to be proud: they are multiple times champions of Oceania Football Confederation. Also, they participated to the last two FIFA World Cups, which is an outstanding performance. For the last tournament (2010) Australia qualified without losing a match and concealing only one goal, being one of the first nations to qualify for the finals. During the tournament, the Socceroos only played during the group stage and failed to surpass it. However, for a country where the soccer isn’t yet a mass phenomenon, that was a great success.